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2026
Client: Komatsu Matere Co., Ltd.
Art Director (Exhibition Planning + Production Supervision): Tsutomu Yoshizaki (MiKS)
Architecture: Yasumasa Hayashi (ArchTank) + Adam Urban (KakaDu)
Aluminum Fixture Supervision: Shu Yokoo
Lighting & Exhibition Coordination: Jann Hawker
Construction: ArchTank + KacaDu
Location: Rho Fiera, Milan, Italy
Ishikawa Prefecture is known as the "country of textiles," boasting some of the world's leading synthetic fiber technologies. One of Ishikawa's proud manufacturers is Komatsu Matere, a chemical materials manufacturer. Since its founding in 1943, the company has leveraged its dyeing and advanced processing technologies to create high-quality products in collaboration with fashion and sports brands around the world.
For Komatsu Matere's participation in the world's premier fabric trade fair, Milano Unica, in Italy, we oversaw the design and production of the exhibit structure and communication tools. The booth was designed and constructed by a multidisciplinary team of professionals, led by ArchTank (Yokohama), a nationally and internationally active company, and KacaDu (Prague), a researcher of space structures.
[Concept: Passing on the uniquely Japanese aesthetic sense through "mitate" (approaching)]
As Komatsu Matere accelerates its global expansion, we felt that the most important thing to convey now was the "correct and beautiful Japanese aesthetic sense." We focused on the uniquely Japanese culture of "mitate" (treating A as B and creating something), which likens one thing to another to discover new value.
Since its founding, the company's journey has seen it evolve from cloth to "fabric" and then to "chemical materials," a history of exploring the possibilities of materials through mitate. This philosophy is scattered throughout the exhibition space.
[Environmental Consideration and Flexible Functional Beauty]
Reflecting the company's commitment to protecting the global environment as a top management priority, the exhibition signs feature a mitate design inspired by hanging scrolls. The hanging curtain structure allows for flexible updating of exhibit content, achieving both waste reduction and information variability. This design ensures the most appropriate information is always communicated, even at the continually challenging venue of the Milano Unica Exhibition in Italy.
The media and information sections of the exhibition signs are made of rolled, richly textured Japanese paper, creating a warm, soft, three-dimensional object in an exhibition space that can often be impersonal. Each product tag features a design of washi paper folded like a traditional Japanese kaishi (Japanese traditional paper folding service). Inspired by Japanese etiquette, where wrapping and folding paper express respect and hospitality, the design embodies the very act of visitors unwrapping the tags.
[New connections born from movement]
The booth's open-ended design allowed visitors to freely interact with a wide variety of materials and experience Komatsu Matere's profound aesthetic sense. This created an exhibition space that appealed to all five senses.
Komatsu Matere's insatiable curiosity, which transcends the concept of fabric, will continue to inspire new materials that are full of surprises and inspiration, leading to a better tomorrow for our society.
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